"Are you the man that poked your stick in my eye?" said Teddy Leonard—turning very leisurely to the speaker—"When a watchman had hold of the two sides of me, each of 'em fast and sure; there was he jumping before me, and poking his stick at me like a cock sparrow. Och! but I wish I know'd you when I see'd you this morning!"
"Well, you know him now," said the magistrate.
"Know him!" replied Teddy Leonard—"not I faith, for it's a disgrace to be after knowing such a consarn; and by the same token, your worship, he, or some of the rest of 'em, pocketed my shoe that night—and I hav'n't got it since, but another."
"But how came you to alarm these honest people in the way you have done?" said the magistrate—"have you a wife of your own?"
"No, indeed—nor like to have; for I'm quite alone, and comfortable."
"Well, then," said his worship, "we must endeavour to make you let other folks be as comfortable as yourself, by calling upon you to find securities for your keeping the peace in future."
"Very good, your worship—that's all very right—and I dare say I'll keep the peace longer nor the peace keeps me," replied comfortable Teddy; and so saying he followed the jailer to his uncomfortable apartments.
BOX-LOBBY LOUNGERS.
Among the watch-house rubbish brought before the magistrate one morning, were three of that description of bipeds commonly called "Lobby Loungers," or "Box-Lobby-loungers," or "Half-and-half swells;" that is to say, half sharp and half flat—half a bottle and half price, half bully and half boor—in plain terms, idle young men, with empty heads and full stomachs; who, in all the magnificence of a full pint of cape, strut into a theatre at half price, and manifest their gentility by swaggering from box to box, pinching the strumpets, d——g the box-keepers, and annoying the sensible part of the audience as much as they dare.